Fortress (4)

Pagan Temple (1)

Other (1)

The architectural complex of Garni was Armenia's foremost center of Hellenistic culture and the summer residence of Armenian kings. It was a fortress in the 3rd century BC and a heathen temple in the 1st century AD. It is now a village in the Kotayk district, some 35 km southeast of Yerevan. A pagan temple was unearthed in 1909-1911 by Academicians Marr and Smirnov. Since 1949, an archaeological group under Professor Arakelyan (Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography of the Armenian Academy of Sciences) has been at work here. As a result, the ruins of a Neolithic camp, a Urartian cuneiform text of the 8th century BC carved on a dragon, and inscriptions in Greek, Aramean and Armenian provide evidence of many centuries of uninterrupted human existence.